Social Media 2018: Facebook & Instagram are updated

This beginning of the year 2018 has been marked by many updates and news regarding social media. And as you know, good management of social networks requires knowledge of new features and updates of algorithms.

It is therefore important to keep abreast of this news so that you can adapt your communication strategy accordingly. So here are the most recent updates for Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat. What to delight (or not) some …

FACEBOOK

STRICTER RULES FOR CONTENTS OF SPONSORED BRANDS

Since 2016, Facebook has been advertising branded content to its users via the “sponsored” link.

Branded content is, by definition, all content published by an influencer or media to promote a brand on the social network. This implies a partnership with financial remuneration.

Thus, Facebook indicates it to its users by the mention “sponsored” on the publication, in order to be more transparent with regard to this type of partnership. In the context of sponsored brand content, the current rules are as follows:

The addition of an advertisement before, during or after a video or audio is prohibited by Facebook;

Facebook banned banner ads on videos and published images through their branded content tool;

If the brand, page or company has not agreed, Facebook and Instagram can not publish content that mentions them, that is to say on which they are identified.

In 2018, Facebook announces a new rule that took effect in March 2018. Sponsored branded content will have to be created by or with the influencer or the media. If not, Facebook will sanction the organic reach of sponsored content.

If, however, the operation is renewed, the social media may go so far as to prohibit access to its monetization tools to the page or the user account in question. We must learn to think well and manage its content on Facebook according to the new standards.

LOCALIZED CONTENT IS NOW PROMOTED

The Insights pages are the data analysis tools made available by Facebook, which gather a set of valuable information about a page: subscribers, publications, mentions “I like” etc. These pages are rich in very useful information and whose analysis is essential to grow a page on the network.

The first novelty is that since February 2018, Facebook has changed the calculation of the organic scope of publications of a page. Indeed, the calculation will count the impressions only when the publication will actually appear on the screen of Internet users. So, if you have observed a slight decrease in your organic reach, this is normal. This is one of the impacts of this update. The calculation of the organic scope is now much more precise and truthful.

The second novelty concerns the design of these Insights pages, especially for the mobile version. Indeed, the design has been optimized, fluidized and made more intuitive and fast. All in order to facilitate the analysis of data provided by these pages.

INSTAGRAM

THE PROGRAMMING OF PUBLICATIONS IS FINALLY POSSIBLE!

We have been several to answer “Hallelujah! At the announcement of this news.

Indeed, to the delight of social media managers, Instagram finally allows the planning of publications for corporate accounts. It is now possible to schedule the publication of content on Instagram through social networking platforms such as Hootsuite for example.

However, it is not yet possible to do it directly from the social media, but it is already very good news!

The only problem is that the photo must be edited beforehand. Indeed, platforms like Hootsuite do not allow to edit content by adding a filter, more or less brightness, writing, etc. Your content must be ready to be published soon.

NEW: CAROUSEL ADVERTISING IN STORIES

A new content format sponsored by brands is made available by Instagram in the stories: carousel ads. It’s about being able to combine up to 3 visuals (photos or videos) in the same advertising story.

With this new feature, brands have more options to promote themselves on social networks. Knowing that this new advertising format is under test, it is only available for some major brands at the moment.

We can quote Gap in the United States for example. So, get ready to test this new format if the test is a success!

With all these updates, we see the shift of social media to more optimized versions that seek to be more transparent and more complete for their users. Whether it involves including data analysis or revising some or all of the communication strategy, brands on social media will have to adapt accordingly to maintain or grow their community.